For those of us in the bifocal set, a breezy ditty whistled as a tall man with an enviable shock of dark hair walks along with his young son toward their favorite fishing hole, rods in the hands of both, is forever and indelibly etched in our minds ear.
“The Andy Griffith Show! Starring Andy Griffith. With Ronnie Howard. Also starring Don Knotts.” It was one of the soundtracks of our youth, today harkening us to an earlier, simpler time. You’re whistling it now, aren’t you?
Mount Airy’s native and most famous son, Andy Griffith, often gets associated with his upright, outgoing and affable TV character, Sheriff Andy Taylor, but Griffith was an actor and a good one, and his true self was a flawed, intense and private person.
To get a better sense of the makeup and impact of the man, I decided to ride my Honda NC750X south from my Virginia home to Mount Airy, North Carolina, enlisting my acquaintance and fellow author Tom Perry as my tour guide.
We arranged to meet at the venerable Boyd’s Restaurant in Ararat, Virginia, smack against the 316 mile “Byrd’s Line,” the border between Virginia and North Carolina.
My ride from Blacksburg was on a crisp but sunny 44-degree, late-winter morning. Through the winding roads of Floyd County, it dropped to 36 degrees with spots of frost on shaded pastures. The winter had been preternaturally warm overall, but on this chilly morning I was glad for my electric vest and heated grips, keeping me just on the edge of comfort. Past lovely Mabry Mill, a Blue Ridge Parkway landmark, and through Meadows of Dan and Mayberry (which I’ll tell you about shortly), I reached world-famous Squirrel Spur Road (which, I admit, may not be world-famous, but should be), on which I plunged off the Blue Ridge Escarpment into the Piedmont, losing around 1,500 feet of elevation in the process.
Squirrel Spur is wonderfully curvy and nicely paved and graded. It should be on any motorcyclist’s list. Atop the plateau, only the daffodils and crocuses were in bloom, but at the bottom, blossoms adorned the trees and spring was well underway. It was a crystalline morning.
The parking lot at Boyd’s was crowded and, walking inside, I spied Perry right away at one of the half-dozen tables. Perry was wearing a pink shirt with an image of the TV show’s Floyd Lawson the barber (get it?). The brick restaurant, across Ararat Highway from the Blue Ridge Elementary School, dated back to 1978.
The menu was a plain piece of double-sided letter-sized paper, with prices from a generation ago — my sausage biscuit was $2.85 and a cheeseburger was $3.65. Owner Rodney Boyd joined us. He told me his parents had grown up in the area.
“I grew up right across the street. My dad worked for a local restaurant chain, Ray’s Kingburger, out of Mount Airy. Come a time, he thought a restaurant might fit in Ararat. So this land became available and he bought it and built this. Ararat was huge in farming back then. New people are coming in, lots of retirees. The school population is smaller now,” Boyd said.
Ararat is named from the Ararat River which flows nearby, a tributary of the Yadkin River which flows through North Carolina to the Pee Dee River and the Atlantic. Nearby Pilot Mountain — with its distinctive “hat” — was thought to resemble a bullfrog, and Native Americans named it “Ratratrat,” after the sound of a bullfrog. Early settlers heard it as “Ararat” which seemed appropriate, the name which according to the Bible is where Noah’s Ark found land through the receding flood.
“On the slopes of the Blue Ridge are lots of fruit orchards, still today,” Perry said. “Down here at the bottom, especially when we were kids, tobacco was big, huge. We’d work the fields and then come to Boyd’s to eat. Everybody had tobacco fields.”
Boyd stood to return to work but paused.
“We still have numerous local customers, but we’re seeing lots of people from out of town, passing through,” he said.
At lunchtime, he still rides a bicycle across the street to deliver food orders to teachers and administrators.
Perry said his dad came in 1959 when it was a high school and became principal. Young Tom grew up a mile away.
Griffith’s mom was from Ararat, Perry said.
“She was Geneva Nunn. His dad was Carl Griffith from Mount Airy. Andy’s Mom’s family had lots of bluegrass musicians. Andy was a talented guitarist and singer. That’s from his mother’s side.”
Many members of Geneva’s family are still here in Patrick County, and Griffith’s father was a renowned raconteur.
“Andy’s first wife said her father-in-law Carl was the best storyteller she ever knew. Andy was a private man. Andy Taylor is a product of great acting. That’s not how Andy Griffith was. Andy based Andy Taylor on his dad, who was more outgoing and extraverted. Andy based a lot of the show’s characters on people he knew,” Perry said.
Perry wrote one of the definitive books about Griffith, “Beyond Mayberry: A Memoir of Andy Griffith and Mount Airy North Carolina,” and is a gifted writer and researcher.
Our conversation migrated to the 1957 movie “A Face in the Crowd,” Griffith’s film debut that launched him to stardom. My cinephile girlfriend had introduced me to the movie recently, a dark story of a drifter named Larry “Lonesome” Rhodes who rides minor stardom on a small-market radio station in Arkansas into national fame and influence, only to turn egomaniacal and violent. Its message resonates today as our media and political landscape is plagued with contemporary con men who ride bombast and vilification of others to great power.
“It was probably the best acting job (Andy) ever did in his life. People who have an image of Andy Taylor don’t like the movie because he’s so dark and different. (Griffith) was good at dark,” Perry said. “Andy came home for the movie’s premier at the Earle Theater in downtown Mount Airy. I imagine the people who grew up with him being astonished by the movie, it was so unlike him.”
•••
Perry and I emerged from the restaurant into a rapidly warming morning. I donned my kit and helmet and rode my Honda behind his Corolla the 10 miles, crossing Byrd’s Line, into Mount Airy. We parked Wally’s Service station, formerly a working station but now a souvenir shop with a replica jail and courthouse beside. It is also home of Mount Airy Squad Car Tours. Behind the retail counter I met Cindy Adams. Cindy had moved from Durango, Colorado, to Mount Airy to be closer to her dad in Bland, Virginia.
“I had been to Mount Airy as a kid, and I remembered it as small-town America. That’s what I was looking for and I absolutely found it. I took a squad car tour and it just felt right, like home,” she said.
Founder Wallace Smith opened the station in 1937.
“What surprises me is how many kids are still watching ‘The Andy Griffith Show.’ The numbers get bigger every year. Not just kids with grandma and grandpa, but teenagers really get into it. It’s still relevant. Every episode has a valuable lesson in it. Kids don’t realize that they’ll use those lessons for the rest of their lives.”
Smiling as she hugged a life-size black-and-white cut-out of Barney Fife, she said, “Mayberry Days is the third week of September and it’s tons of fun, Monday through Sunday. I work 12-14 hour days and I don’t even realize it. It has the longest parade you’ll ever see. I enjoy seeing the return guests.”
Perry and I decided to take one of the squad car tours. While we waited, we explored the reproduction courthouse, locking ourselves in the jail. Finally one of the squad cars returned, disgorged its passengers, and its driver, Carroll Hooker, invited us inside.
“This is a 1963 Ford Galaxy. The fleet includes cars from 1961 to 1967, one each for the years the show was on. From what we understand, this was a real California patrol car. I started here three years ago and this has always been my car. The folks who come to visit with us are Andy Griffith fans. Some astound me of their knowledge of the show and Andy personally. I think of them not as tourists but as new friends. To me it’s a blessing to be part of Squad Car Tours,” he said.
Our first stop was the nearby North Carolina Granite Corporation, the largest granite quarry in the world. Founded in 1889, it covers 90 acres. Seismologists have estimated that the same consistency of granite goes down 8,000 feet, ensuring a long future. It produces granite for buildings, countertops, monuments, tombstones, street curbing and more. The quarry employs 140 workers, down from 1,000 at the turn of the 20th century. Production is still on the rise. It is said it can be seen from space, or in our case on Google Earth.
“Many of our nicer churches here in Mount Airy are made from this granite,” Perry said.
Driving away, our tour guide ran the siren. I felt like a child.
“The look kids have on their faces at Disney World,” Hooker said. “Mayberry is a place, but really an attitude. It’s a break from the bad stuff we see on the news every night, for just a moment, to be back in Mayberry. For us, it’s every day.”
The driving tour took us past many churches, most built from that local granite. Many homes were in granite, too. The whole town was lovely, homey, and architecturally pleasing. I was particularly struck by a relatively new mural, painted wide across the side of a downtown building, with five separate poses of Andy’s face. Superimposed paradoxically boldly but unobtrusively was an outline of Mount Pilot. A masterpiece.
We stopped for photos at Andy’s homeplace, a small, unassuming cottage that now is available for daily rent. We drove the one-way Main Street past famous Snappy Lunch, reputedly the only real restaurant mentioned in the show, and Floyd’s Barber Shop. The tour ended too soon, so we headed back downtown for a longer visit.
Inside Floyd’s Barber Shop, we spoke with Bill Hiatt who told us the shop, originally City Barber Shop, opened in 1929 and moved into the current location in 1947. His father, Russell, started barbering there.
“Floyd’s Barber Shop on the show was modeled after it, so they renamed this shop. Dad said Andy’s head was the third he cut out of barber school. Andy was just an ordinary guy around here then. After Andy left, dad said he turned to the other guys and said, ‘I don’t know about you guys, but at barber school they never taught me to cut a head of hair like Andy’s: thick, black and wavy.’ A haircut in those days was probably 15 or 20 cents,” Hiatt said.
The store walls were completely covered by photos of customers and visitors, and other memorabilia. There was a painting of Hiatt’s father cutting Griffith’s hair.
Perry posed for a photo while Hiatt pretended to snip away.
•••
Shadows were beginning to lengthen as my psychic compass and motorcycle turned northward, back up the mountain. Squirrel Spur Road was just as entertaining on the way up as it had been on the way down, and uncrowded, too.
Then I went to the real Mayberry.
The Mayberry of “The Andy Griffith Show” was fictional, but there is a speck of a community some 22 miles north of Mount Airy with that name. My friend Pam Puckett Frazier’s Mayberry Trading Post is the only commercial enterprise there, and the cornerstone of the community. Puckett and I met a decade ago when portrait artist Leslie Roberts Gregg and I featured her as our “granny quilter” in our book “Keepers of the Tradition.” Built in 1892, it predates nearby Mabry Mill, built in 1905. Puckett bought the store in 2022 and has invested considerable time and money into refurbishing it.
The store was closed for the season but I stopped anyway to get photos and called her the next day to check in. She told me of her history with the store and her interest and eventual ownership.
“I was raised here in Mayberry and a lot of my childhood was spent in the store,” she said. “My family, on both my mother’s and father’s sides, owned it for much of its existence. Uncle Coy owned it then, and my brother and I would look for pop-bottles on the road and get pennies for returning them and spend the money on candy. In the early days, it was a true country store, serving a thriving community.
A family named Mabry settled in the area, but in those days spelling had variations, she said. So she thinks Mayberry had the same origin.
“I wanted to keep it open, to keep its tradition alive. I felt like it was my turn. I remember vividly from seven years old telling my momma that when I grew up, I wanted to work in the Mayberry Trading Post and maybe someday own it. I was always drawn to the place. It’s my place of peace,” she said.
She sells many things made by local craftspeople and artists, including my books. Pottery. Woodworking. Quilts.
“I tell people I sell everything from Beanie Weenies to fine art. It’s not about (customers) running into a convenience store and buying a pack of Nabs. It’s about conversations, reminiscences, and friendships. It is the repository of our tradition,” Puckett said.
“Andy’s grandparents owned land behind the store. He spent many summers there with them. When it came time to come up with a name for the community on his TV show, he didn’t want people bothering his parents and grandparents. So Andy suggested calling it Mayberry, from his memories as a child,” Puckett said. “In my store, customers will see much the same things their parents or grandparents would have seen. This is part of our history worth saving. The Mayberry state of mind is still real here. Families can bring their kids, buy Moon Pies and drinks and let their kids fly kites while everybody just sits and talks. This is not a Sheetz.”
Michael Abraham is the author of “Keepers of the Tradition” and seven other books, available on his website at mabrahamauthor.com Author and historian Tom Perry can be reached at www.laurel-hill-publishing-llc.square.site
